Clients fail to send config requests and basic inventory with pcAnywhere Plug-in installed

Products

• Management Platform (Formerly known as Notification Server)

Issue/Introduction

Symantec Management Agent is in a state where it stops sending the getclientpolicies request and basic inventory. Restarting the SMA service temporarily resolves problem.

Cause

Failed upgrade of pcA Solution plugin. An upgrade of the pcAnywhere plug-in failed with the issue described in TECH187737. This failure causes the pcAnywhere Agent to lock the Symantec Management Agent as it is unable to complete its process of applying the configuration.  This lock causes the Symantec Management Agent to not be able to make configuration requests or send basic inventory.

Resolution

Symantec recommends applying the following steps to address these issues.

Apply the updated pcAClientInstallManager.exe mentioned in the KB “pcANSHost.BHF is not a valid pcAnywhere file”, http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH187737, or install pcAnywhere Solution 12.6.7 HF1, which already contains this update to all SMP servers. See http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH206021 for more information.

Additionally, apply the attached pointfix to the pcAnywhere plug-in package on all SMP servers.  This update contains new plug-in installers that contain the fix outlined above which, for future deployments, will not cause the Symantec Management Agent to stop communicating with the SMP server.

Name of the modified component:

• Symantec_pcAnywhere_plugin_installer.msi 
• Symantec_pcAnywhere_plugin_installer_x64.msi

Areas of impact due to the modification: 

• pcAnywhere plug-in installation policy

This update can be applied to pcAnywhere Solution versions 12.6.7 (8096) and 12.6.7 Hotfix1 (8209)

Steps to apply this update:

1. On ITMS Server machine, go to “C:\Program Files\Altiris\Notification Server\NSCap\bin\Win32\X86\pcAAgent”.
2. Take backup of existing Symantec_pcAnywhere_plugin_installer.msi and Symantec_pcAnywhere_plugin_installer_x64.msi.
3. Replace attached Symantec_pcAnywhere_plugin_installer.msi and Symantec_pcAnywhere_plugin_installer_x64.msi (from ET#3236149.zip).
4. Run the below tasks from the task scheduler. (run > Taskschd.msc)
   1. NS.Package Distribution Point update schedule
   2. NS.Package Refresh
   3. NS.Package Server Status Event Capture Item

After updating the pcAClientInstallManager.exe, or installing HotFix1, and then applying the attached pointfix, uninstall and reinstall the pcAnywhere plugin from clients via policy.